


Not of Rising

by orphan_account



Series: The first and second Witness [2]
Category: Sleepy Hollow (TV)
Genre: F/M, Five times Ichabod and Abbie wound up accidentally touching
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-07
Updated: 2013-10-07
Packaged: 2017-12-28 16:26:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,878
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/994060
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Five times Abbie Mills and Ichabod Crane are too close for actual comfort.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Not of Rising

**I.**

Abbie Mills doesn't sleep like you would expect. 

Well, it's true. She's tiny, a tiny ball of five foot four rage and justice. Made worse by Ichabod, who towers more than a foot over her head, one would not expect the range and tangle of limbs in which she can sleep absolutely anywhere. Most would expect little Abbie to stay little during sleep, but that's exactly the wrong case.

Years of being in the system, of sleeping on questionable beds that squeak under the slightest movement, or sleeping on carpet that smells of too much perfume other things she doesn't want to speak of. 

So, shorthand, Abbie Mills can also sleep anywhere. 

And at the precinct, her fellow bringers of Sleepy Hollow order-and-justice understand the strain of a double shift, so when one officer or another lines four crappy office chairs together to catch half an hour, no one really notices. 

Also, before Ichabod Crane, the most common call into the precinct was startled _sheep_. 

But Abbie, orphan Abbie, spreads out. She spreads out and she comforms to whatever shape she is leaning against or sleeping on, and she manages to sleep. 

Ichabod Crane doesn't sleep like you would expect. 

Ichabod grew up to work at Oxford, yes, but that was in his youth. Ichabod spent more time in field hospitals and bunking on the ground with eight hundred and forty-four other soldiers that had to make camp and sleep in the unforgiving New York winter. Ichabod had to learn how to sleep on the roughest of terrain, in the coldest of the cold, as still as possible because moving or turning would remove his threadbare blanket. 

And despite having quite the tall, lanky frame, he manages to do it. Ichabod can fall asleep in one position, and awaken still  _in_ that position. 

It just so happens, once, in the archives, in that little three chair bench, that Abbie hooks her legs up over the middle seat and curls up. She curls up, and gets fifteen minutes because in the past four days she's had maybe ten hours of sleep and even the second witness needs sleep. 

What she doesn't understand is that she traps Ichabod's coat between her legs. Ichabod notices this about three minutes in, when he wanted to go pick up another inaccurate book about history, and makes to get up but he can't. He gently yanks on his coat, because he doesn't want to wake Abbie, and finds that there is no probable way to get out of his coat— it's buttoned almost to his chin, without waking Miss Mills. 

He may, or may not, sit back in the seat, defeated, and cross his arms. And he might close his eyes for just a moment. And he might wake up with Abigail's boot in his lap. 

 

**II.**

There's the time with the handcuffs. 

Abbie won't talk about it, because she's half-sure it didn't actually happen. It  _didn't_ happen, goddammit, because there was lots of witchcraft going on at the time and murders and sleepy demons and there really is no one alive that can confirm or deny what happened, so as long as she denies it, she thinks she's safe. 

But Ichabod is quite sure that one of the Dark Coven in Sleepy Hollow managed to bespell Miss Mill's shackles and make them bind he and Abbie's wrists together. 

What happens to both Abbie's key and Abbie's backup key, however, is another matter entirely. 

And, of course, that would be the time that the Sleepy Hollow Library goes dark and the doors lock from the outside and they get trapped for a couple hours. 

"Crane," Abbie tells him, "You gotta stop moving, I can't reach." 

And Ichabod might listen, if he wasn't too busy trying to reach for a book he spotted on the shelf and he nearly manages to lift Abbie from the ground. 

And after a while they both end up leaning against a bookcase with their arms stretched out as far as they can go, each on one opposite side of the isle, mirroring each other. Ichabod has a book in his lap, and Abigail is trying to shape a hairpin with her teeth. 

"I cannot deny, Miss Mills," Ichabod says as he watches Abbie stick the hairpin in the shackle lock and fiddle, "Your less than admiral background might be of use to us."

"Background," Abbie says with an eyebrow raised, "Or ' _background'_."

 

 **III**.

Abbie gets shot. 

Abbie has gotten shot a grand total of three times. Once was when she had been thirteen, and Jenny had been fourteen, and the foster home that they had been in for three months had another foster kid that had a bad habbit of lighting a lot of matches. 

The second time was in her second year of the force, with the first and only domestic disturbance that she had seen until that day and after, and she takes one in the shoulder. It wasn't serious, it had been through and through, and she was on desk duty for three weeks until she had been cleared to resume active duty. 

The third time is not so lucky. 

Ichabod accidentally leads them down a well in which they believed the ashes of an ancient biblical beast remained. Whatever it was that had been following them managed to fire a simple ricochet that bounced off the walls of the well above them before hitting her squarely in the abdomen. 

And Abbie completely shuts up about it. 

Mostly because whatever headless wonder was two steps behind them was probably listening— could he listen if he didn't have a head? So she covers her mouth with one hand, bunches her jacket up with the other and presses it to the place where she can feel the blood. Ichabod stays besides her, pressed against the well wall, and both of them stay completely silent for the sound of the horseman moving away. 

It never comes. 

And Abbie, being herself, resovles not to tell Ichabod about it— because it doesn't feel that bad, really. If they can just make it out of this well, she should be fine. They have a first-aid kit in her cruiser, that will be enough to tide them over until they can get to a hospital. 

But Ichabod is altogether too sharp, damn him, and he notices the hitch in the first breath she takes after a time. 

And then there is much more blood than she might have felt a few minutes ago. And pain. Quite a bit more pain. 

And Ichabod— Ichabod died in a medical tent in the revolutionary war. Katrina worked in that same medical tent. He's seen men ripped apart by wayward cannonball fire, he's seen men with their hearts ripped out after being burnt to a crisp, he's seen men blown up by their own mistake with the gunpowder. He knows gunshots, but his twenty-first medical terminology is sadly lacking. 

Suffice it to say, he knows enough to pull the bullet out and sow up the wound. How or where he gets the needle and thread, Abbie doesn't know because honestly her vision was two blurry dots in a canvas of black, but with her help, Ichabod manages to stop the worst of it. 

And Abbie swears to make him take a proper first-aid class. 

Ichabod still carries his official first-aid card on his person even after it expires. 

 

 **IV**.

When you spend almost every waking moment with someone, you start to learn the inner workings of their bodies. You learn which foot they favor. You learn which side of the park bench they prefer to sit on. You learn that little blindspot they have behind their right ear which you should always cover if both of you have your weapons drawn. 

But you also learn the aches and pains of your partner. 

Abbie, for instance, her lower back kills her from time to time. Not a sharp pain, not like the kind she's used to, but a pretty steady ache that comes from too much time in a crappy office chair or at the diner with apple pie with Corbin. 

Ichabod, on the other hand, has a spot just on his left shoulder that bothers him— maybe a particular old war wound that he just refuses to talk about, but Abbie notices. She notices the way that he tucks his hands behind his back differently when his shoulder is bothering him. The way he stands his different, the way he acts is different, and after some time, Abbie learns how to alleviate as much as she possibly can. 

And Ichabod notices just about everything, but he can't say he notices  _when_ Abbie starts prodding at his shoulder. He doesn't, so focused he is on an older map of Sleepy Hollow's unmarked gravesights, but in the next hour or so, his shoulder stops hurting. 

A month later, when a large thunderstorm rocks Sleepy Hollow that might not entirely be of natural causes, his shoulder starts hurting again, Abigail stands slightly behind and to the left of him and prods at his shoulder again. Ichabod leans into it, because just that right amount of pressure feels good. 

And of course, Ichabod would never admit that, because that would be just terribly improper. 

(But he also might give Abbie the more comfortable chair when her back is hurting.)

 

**V.**

There are some nights when they get to Abbie's upstairs apartment so late that all they have on their minds is  _food_. Food is great, really, why don't they just carry food with them. But Abbie, unfortunately, doesn't really have anything fresh. She prefers food that will last for weeks, maybe months if she's careful— so you'll find a lot of canned and dried goods in her cubboard. 

Ichabod, on the other hand, prefers fresh things, fresh food with little to no added perservatives because damn him the bastard can actually taste the difference. 

But this night, in particular, they settle on good, old fashioned, tomato soup and grilled cheese. It's good, it warms their bones from a chilly October, and they can sit on her couch and eat and slurp as much as they like— Ichabod doesn't slurp, thank you, he eats like a gentleman— they don't even turn on her little TV. 

It's mostly because they're tired. It's been a long, freaky week, and they have ended up on a Friday signifigantly less in-tact than they were last Saturday and there's something to be said about just sitting down and trying to ignore the oncoming migraine. 

But Abbie likes to spread out, and Ichabod sleeps like a board. 

So Abbie turns so her feet hang off the end of the couch, one foot over the back and one over the arm, puts one arm over her eyes and tries to block out the light from the kitchen. And Ichabod, he slips his boots off and puts his feet up on the ottoman nearby. 

By the morning Ichabod is almost horizontal with one leg over the arm on his side, and Abbie is smushed against the back of the couch. She's on top of Ichabod's arm and has been there so long that he can no longer feel it. 


End file.
